Does Evil always disguise itself as Good?
David Koresh, Marshall Applewhite, Jim Jones… all could be accused of evil acts against humanity. Yet in their own minds, they were good and noble leaders who only wished to protect their followers from the evil outside world.
Did not Hitler believe he was doing good for his nation, and for the world?
What about the child molester? They may have been told that what they are doing is wrong, but in their eyes, the tempting pleasure is too great. The molester feels good from pursuing his decadence.
Even the intentionally malevolent will plot and strike out against you because of the perceived good it will bring them.
Does Evil always disguise itself as Good?
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33 Answers
I think these people’s perspective as to the righteousness of their cause and/or actions doesn’t apply to evil disguising itself as good.
In their own minds they may be in the right… but to those outside their immediate environment there is no perception of good… hence no disguise.
Delusion would be a better term to use.
I think always might be a strong word, but you do have an interesting point here. I think your examples probably had some serious mental illnesses that they couldn’t keep under control, or didn’t want to keep under control, which resulted in evil acts.
@Dr_C I’m not sure this is a troll question, actually.
Evil packaged as good will always have a greater following than evil that is just evil. All the better to promote it. The devil himself will be disguised as a handsome, charismatic, sensible person. Otherwise, what is the appeal?
@lazydaisy i resent the idea that i am in disguise!
Evil doesn’t exist. Every person felt hate sometime for another and everyone of us already hurt others. The only difference between me and Hitler is that he had the actual power to realize his dreams and that his interests were only good for a very small group of people, namely the Germans. My interests and opinions may be profitable to more people, because for example many people would profit from the freedom and well-being I indulge in, but there will always be people who don’t profit from my opinion, however ‘morally good’ they may be. The existence of evil is just a little fairy tale for littld children which we tell them because then they don’t have to accept that humans can do wrong things like killing others; they just put the label ‘evil’ on people like Hitler and don’t have to worry about him anymore. Well wake up, there is neither good nor evil!
No sometimes bad is bad, good is bad, bad feels good, good looks bad, bad seems right, good seems bad and good is good.
And it’s been my experience that Good girls go to Heaven but Bad Girls go down.
Before acting on something a human must justify it to themselves (though not necessarily in a rational manner) else they would be acting without reason and an easy means of justifying any action is by convincing oneself that it is ‘good’ and ‘right’. This generally tends to be rather simple given that most, if not all, humans actions reflect their best interests (they may also reflect others interests but theirs are usually prioritised) and so to consider their actions ‘good’ inevitably means that their ideology and understanding of the matter they are acting on is also ‘good’ providing them with a gentle ‘ego-boost’ making the process seem more appealing.
An additional argument I would offer is that neither ‘good’ nor ‘evil’ exist except in a conceptual context and therefore our perspectives towards the matter are purely subjective. However, in the interests of discussion I shall assume that this question refers to the definitions of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ most commonly applied by the populants of western societies.
@Dr C
aw you flatter me.. i’m just another spoke in the wheel
@lazydaisy: I agree with your words but thinking beyond good and evil as religious terms. Great answer!
@realeyes: nice to see you give it another shot here :)
Im growing my beard and hair to look like Jesus Christ, so yes im disguising myself in good.
@Triiiple i’m actually named Jesus… i went all the way with my disguise!
No.
To elaborate, good and evil are subjective terms.
To Westerners, female circumcision is evil but to those who practice female genital mutilation out of cultural tradition, they see it as good.
The face of evil is sometimes as plain as day too but even then, don’t be too sure that what you perceive is reality.
@VzzBzz
I’m about as non-religious as they come. There are all kinds of devils
@lazydaisy: Agreed again, there are all kinds of devils!
@Dr_C: shh, I was trying to keep your secret identity secret
This question over simplifies good and evil. This isn’t a black and white universe we live in. What defines good and evil is purely subjective.
I think sometimes evil-doers actually believe they are doing good, and manage to convince the public to think they are serving a righteous purpose. I don’t know i you can call those people “evil” because, as @AstroChuck mentioned just above, evil is subjective. If a person believes he is doing good, I think he’s delusional, but not necessarily evil. Like George W. Bush- I think he honestly believed he was making the best choices for his country mostly. He might be incredibly stupid, or sadly misinformed by his staff and vp, but not evil. There may be people in the world who know that what they do is evil, but “can’t help it.” Like killers, molesters, etc. They want to change- like the movie The Woodsman with Kevin Bacon. He tries very much to change, and wants to pay for his sins. His character is a child molester. At one point he finds himself alone with a girl in the park. He tells her to run home because he knows he’s dangerous. Is he still evil?
I don’t think that undisguised bad intentions will get you much cooperation. So you have to act as if you have good intentions, if you are to sucker people. However, sometimes people do have good intentions, but things go wrong, and they get sucked into a maze with no way out, but to be evil.
No, not always. Here’s an example:
Mein Kampf, in English: My Struggle, is a book dictated by Adolf Hitler. It combines elements of autobiography with an exposition of Hitler’s political goals. Volume 1 of Mein Kampf was published in 1925 and Volume 2 in 1926. All the evil plans based on a perverse ideology were in there, in cold print. No disguise.
Yes, it may be so, but not always.
People have a great ability to rationalize their actions and approve of them in their own minds. This could be considered a disguise, I suppose, but to an outside observer their actions can normally be seen in a very different light.
Sure, there have been charismatic people who have misled many others, but in order to accept the actions as good, there needs to be an internal rationalization.
By having honest dialogue without leaping to emotional conclusions, these rationalizations can usually be exposed and examined. Actually determining Good from Evil can be a difficult process, but there are definitely extreme examples of both that can be pointed to and plainly seen by the vast majority of observers.
How’s that for talking around an answer?
I believe evil disguises itself by telling truths along with one lie to gain your trust.
not always. i sometimes see evil as just being plain evil to lure people into the idea of power.
Unmask the Impostors Good and Evil and discover Truth.
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